USA cancels planned moon mission.

President Barack Obama is redirecting America's space program, killing NASA's $100 billion plans to return astronauts to the moon and using much of that money for new rocket technology research.

The moon mission, which had already cost $9.1 billion, was based on old technology and revisiting old places astronauts had already been, officials said. The previous NASA chief, in selling the old moon plan, had even called it "Apollo on steroids." The rockets were based on space shuttle boosters.

"Simply put, we're putting the science back into the rocket science at NASA," White House science adviser John Holdren said at a budget briefing Monday.

The $4 billion that NASA spends yearly on human space exploration will now be used for what NASA and White House officials called dramatic changes in rocketry, including in-orbit fueling. They said eventually those new technologies would be used to send astronauts to a nearby asteroid, a brief foray back to the moon, or the Martian moons.

The White House plan was short on details, such as where astronauts would fly next, on what type of rocketship, or when. However, officials were quick to point out the failures of the Bush administration's moon program, called Constellation. It included the construction of two types of rockets, Ares I and Ares V, and an Orion crew capsule. All were canceled. Shutting down the program will cost about $2.5 billion, NASA said.

Former President George W. Bush proposed the moon mission after the Feb. 1, 2003, space shuttle Columbia disaster that claimed seven lives — exactly seven years ago Monday. And congressional boosters of the plan aren't willing to give up on it just yet.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and chairman of the Senate space subcommittee, said he will hold a hearing later this month to see if Congress could rescue some parts of the Ares rocket programs.

"This is a pretty substantial change," said MIT astronautics professor Ed Crawley, who was on a special panel that looked at the future of spaceflight for the White House. "It is more change than I thought they'd take on."

Crawley said the Bush moon plan was well thought out, but based on existing technologies and underfunded.

"We didn't lose the moon today; we very subtly lost the moon a long time ago when the amount of money disappeared a few years ago," Crawley said.

Besides redirecting money to new technologies, NASA is getting an extra $6 billion over five years to encourage companies to build private spaceships that NASA could rent. Many of those companies are run by Internet pioneers, including Blue Origin, headed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Another firm, SpaceX, run by PayPal founder Elon Musk, is already building private rockets.

In a teleconference Monday, Musk said that within three years of getting a contract with NASA, he could deliver astronauts to the International Space Station for about $20 million a head — cheaper than the $50 million Russia is charging the United States.

NASA now has seven companies getting money to work on planning for some types of commercial spaceships.

Former NASA associate administrator Scott Pace, now a professor of space policy at George Washington University, said relying so much on commercial companies is taking a big chance because they might not deliver on time or on budget.

"The risks are higher, the goals are more vague," Pace said of the new space policy. "It's more money but probably not enough."

NASA will also spend an additional $2.5 billion over five years for more research on how global warming is affecting Earth, including replacing a carbon dioxide monitoring satellite that crashed last year. NASA will also extend the life by several years of the International Space Station, which had been slated for retirement in 2016. NASA's yearly budget is $19 billion.

NASA said if the private companies work well on their unproven spaceships, astronauts could fly in them to the space station as soon as 2016. After the next five space shuttle flights, NASA will have to hitch rides to the space station on Russian rockets.

"The truth is we were not on a sustainable path to get back to the moon," NASA administrator Charles Bolden said in a telephone conference call. "We were neglecting investments in key technologies."

Congressional officials howled over lost programs and jobs, but it is hard for Congress to save such a large program that is being cut with redistributed money. Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., called the cancellation of the moon mission the "death march for the future of U.S. human space flight."

Now this clearly shows there is no reason to go to the moon except for propaganda reasons, and that is why probably China is going to the moon, to show to the world they are now the number 1 superpower!

Former NASA associate administrator Scott Pace, now a professor of space policy at George Washington University, said relying so much on commercial companies is taking a big chance because they might not deliver on time or on budget.

you mean the profit motive isn't perfect? you mean the public system might be more efficient in some case? blasted libertarians, they lied to me all that time!

This reminds me of a weird dream I had last night. You know that orbiter that they're sending to Pluto; New Horizons? I had a dream it landed in my room and totally ruined that mission and I got in a lot of trouble, which was a bunch of bullshit because it wasn't like I tried to get the orbiter here or anything. Losers!

All moon landing conspiracies aside, isn't it a good thing that the money is being re-directed for something more useful? Maybe we'll find something totally awesome and learn how to send everyone to Mars since Earth is going to be uninhabitable in .. a long time, but still? Maybe in trying to find better rocket fuel, they'll find better domestic vehicle fuel! Optimistic, stupid, but possible maybe!

The United States has been to the moon enough times already. After the first landing they went back a number of times, installing reflectors on those trips to prove to people they went there. It's much more useful for the US to try and find a way to go to Mars imo.

The problem I have though is Obama has embarked on a plan to privatize parts of NASA, or contract out some of it to private developers. Science is getting pushed further back.

Now this clearly shows there is no reason to go to the moon except for propaganda reasons, and that is why probably China is going to the moon, to show to the world they are now the number 1 superpower!

The whole China scare is a load of tripe. They have an economy that is just ahead of Japan by the SLIGHTEST of margins. In terms of total economic weight the USA is 3 times that size. And, even adjusted for purchasing power parity the Chinese citizen per capita is quite poor by USA standards. Per capita the average USA citizen has over six times as much money.

Also, let China get to the moon. We did it decades ago. Let them have fun being 40 years late to the party.

Soviet cogitations: 4779Defected to the U.S.S.R.: 12 May 2010, 07:43Ideology: Other LeftistPolitburo

21 Apr 2011, 08:47

Quote:

I was thinking the same thing, wasn't the space race years ago? Why is china even trying to set up a space program

You don't have to have competition between two superpowers or some ideological struggle or whatever. I mean, Russia still has a space program going, and the European Union is working on something too. The Space Race between the US and the USSR being over doesn't mean other countries won't try to develop space programs of their own for the purposes of scientific research, technological advancement, or even national pride.

China is simply trying to stay in the game and not end up falling behind or becoming dependent, and in fact, it has been developing its own "space program" in a sense for decades, but mostly for satellites (there's communications, and then there's "communications") and not about putting people on the moon. That, and the Chinese have to constantly deal with condescending attitudes like these

Cootie wrote:

Also, let China get to the moon. We did it decades ago. Let them have fun being 40 years late to the party.

You know, attitudes like this is why Americans (and I do consider myself one, by virtue of living here as a permanent resident and seeking US citizenship) get a bad rep around the world, and also why a lot of Chinese immigrants to the US feel ill-at-ease. Also, maybe if the West and Japan hadn't been so intent on fragging China over for well over a century, the Chinese could have been in on the party at around the same time.

“Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals” - Mark Twain

^ Komissar, I disagree. I don't think nationalism can coexist with space exploration. Think about it: a human has been to the moon. Many times. There's no need to rehash the experiment, it's been done plenty of times and plenty of resources and time have been wasted on achieving that milestone, over and over. Now there are practical applications for orbital manned space-missions, and the US has cooperated with the Russian government so that they're not working on the same thing, since the Russians already have dudes up there.

There's no real reason for China to want to get in on this game. If anything, the whole world or G20 can come together and try to do the whole space flight thing. The symbolic victory over the moon has been won, for humans.

There's no real reason for China to want to get in on this game. If anything, the whole world or G20 can come together and try to do the whole space flight thing. The symbolic victory over the moon has been won, for humans.

Now, that doesn't sound like a bad idea. All the Great Powers of the world going up in space together for some kind of peace show. They could put a UN flag up on the moon right next to the American one and make a big sappy television event about it.

The moon? Did you not get the point of my post? The moon is done, it's over. It's a rock, we went on the rock and saw it. Now there's no reason for us to go back there with the technology that we have.

Also, let China get to the moon. We did it decades ago. Let them have fun being 40 years late to the party.

Have a think about this for a moment. The technology the US used to get men to the moon was scrapped more than 30 years ago in favour of the space shuttle (which has proven to be a gigantic flop btw). This means that capability no longer exists and NASA will have to start developing it again pretty much from scratch. The Chinese may be 40 years behind in achievement but they aren't 40 years behind in capability. In this way, China is catching up to and is in some respects ahead of the US. Yes, their current space technology is based off Russian designs, but keep in mind that NASA needed to ask the Russians for help in developing adequate life support systems for the international space station among other things the station couldn't be in orbit today without.

I wouldn't be surprised if the first people to set foot on Mars will be carrying the flag of the PRC.